Daily Archives: February 20, 2009

No, the answer is not turquoise, it’s mountain snow and lowland
cold rain and snow.

The SCWBL’s (Sunny, Calm and Boring Weather Lovers) have been so
spoiled lately with this split-flow pattern, bringing us sunshine,
mild temperatures, and calm weather. But models have been insisting
on a change to the weather pattern for quite some time, and they
have been pretty consistent about it too. I guess this means the
DCRSCWL’s (Dark, Cloudy, Rainy, Snowy, Cold Weather Lovers) will
soon get their turn.

The above maps indicate the chances for above, near, or below
normal temperatures and precipitation. The map on the left
illustrates a 60% chance of below normal temperatures for our area,
hence the dark blue color. The map on the right is calling for a
40-50% chance for above normal precipitation. This is good news and
bad news. Good news? Mountain snow. Bad news? A potential late
winter/early spring 2008 repeat where we saw cold weather and snow
until the end of April.

In the short term, the next threat for precipitation is on
Sunday as a front moves through late Saturday night and overtakes
the area Sunday morning. It doesn’t look incredibly cold, however,
as highs will still be in the upper 40s/lower 50s due to the warm
air mass in place when the precip arrives.

A typical spring-like pattern will occur through most of next
week: periods of rain, sunbreaks, and highs in the mid to upper
40s. This will definitley be a colder pattern than what we’ve
experienced this past week as highs will be below normal.

Some even colder air moves into the area Thursday and Friday
dropping high temperatures and snow levels much lower than they
should be this time of year. Temperatures: Highs in the low to mid
40s, lows in the upper 20s to lower 30s. Snow levels: 700-1,000′,
mainly in the late night/early morning hours. With these
ingredients, we could see a mixture of rain and snow on some of the
hills around Kitsap on Friday. I won’t go too much into specifics
yet, but just be aware a colder pattern is setting up for the end
of next week which could spell W-E-T, S-L-O-P-P-Y, and S-N-O-W.

Looking farther into la la land, some very cold and wet weather
will continue to roll into the Pacific Northwest, making the Kitsap
Peninsula susceptible to more of the white stuff…granted the long
range models pan out as expected.